What makes a monster?
Monster
The Cambridge International Dictionary of English gives two meanings for the noun ‘monster’: “any imaginary frightening creature, esp. one which is large and strange” and “a cruel and frightening person”. In the era that produced the Beowulf manuscript monstrosity could apparently also mean a strange creature, an evil person or a mixture of the two. As is now commonly accepted, Beowulf would probably not have been part of MS Cotton Vitellius A.xv had it not been for the appearance of monsters. The other four texts, translations of The Passion of St. Christopher, The Wonders of the East, The Letter of Alexander to Aristotle, and Judith, all contain references to or descriptions of monsters. Some of the monsters described in The Wonders of the East, are man-shaped but sufficiently different to deserve the term ‘monster’; most of these are also dangerous to man. But the monster in St. Christopher is the saint himself, who is reported to have a dog’s head. Here, the monstrosity lies only without. The Letter of Alexander to Aristotle again contains descriptions of monstrous creatures who threaten the lives of the men they encounter. Judith is the only text to contain a monster of the purely inward type: Holofernes, who tries to have his way with the saintly Judith, is in all visible aspects a normal man. His behaviour marks him as a monster.
In Beowulf, three monsters play a part. The denomination of two of them—Grendel and his mother—remains an enigma: are they ‘creatures’ or ‘persons’? Grendel is repeatedly called a thane, a man, or a manlike being, but also a ghost, a demon, and a creature; Grendel’s mother is referred to as having the shape of a woman, but is also called a ‘brymwulf’, a sea-wolf. I think the poet wishes to stress the difference of these two as much as he wishes to stress their closeness to the human world: their ancestor Cain was, after all, a man. His deeds and those of his descendants mark them out as monsters, becoming outwardly as hideous as their insides. Grendel and his mother are of this kin, partly human, partly non-human, wholly monstrous.
Not only are there three main monsters in “Beowulf,” but the brave man himself is one, too. Beowulf appeared to be a “good” guy and a hero but in the end, his pride was the inner monster that caused him to feel unhappy and miserable for many years to come. In the movie, “Beowulf (2007),” stated to his wife/Queen “Remember me not as a hero but as a man with flaws…” Every human has an inner monster inside them but it is up to us control it.
The fact that the monsters of Beowulf are partly human and partly creature, makes them even more monstrous. The human qualities of the monsters trick you into a false image of them only to have it be wiped away by their forms of creatures. They pull you into a false hope that, they have humanity, and then they rip it away from you as they slip into their creature forms and devastate the reader with their despicable acts.
Maybe he is like Gollum from Lord of The Rings. He was once a human and he bacame a monster. He has a hatred for the humans becase they made him that way and took what was “precious” to him.
There really isn’t an exact definition of a monster. Anything could be defined that way in different eyes. What it really comes to, is that we all have our “monster” moments. Grendel is a monster but we can’t forget that he is also a human. As we are humans but we can’t forget that we can be “monsters.”
I believe the reason why the author made Grendel part human and part monster is because it creates an image of a man in grief much like Gollum from Lord of the Rings. Grendel than finds people on his land and most likely reacts in self defense more than a blind-fury monster that eats people for fun.
A monster is a gigantic or just a cruel and gruesome object. It does not need to be a person but needs to be demonic. a monster can be more easy to scare people when it is half human half monster. it is what shows people what we can turn into, and it is sort of like looking through the fake and false exterior of a person and seeing the true evil monster that lives within all of us. people are evil at nature and heart, we are only taught to be good and the difference of right and wrong. but without being domesticated people would kill for survival.
My personal opinion on what makes something a monster is not the killer or the chaos spreading creatures as told in fairy tales and story books. Monsters are the things that create something more profound then a disturbance of the peace, but a massive and overwhelming suffering among people. Grendel is a somewhat lesser monster by the fact he caused suffering among Hrothgar’s people and killed many men to cause it, killing those soldiers was an act to spread fear. The true artistry of a monster is one that makes all people suffer and tries to make it an intense lasting pain that they can feel. For example a man who makes friends with people, sleeps with their wives, kills them, lies, blames others, pits people of great friendship against one another, and spread hatred and agony among people causing their own destruction and pain. To feed off the suffering and pain of other humans and creatures purely to feel good and exhilarated. That Is a real monster, someone that you can feel real trust, care, affection, love, and happiness from that feeds off of you and makes you suffer and be happy about it.
- The author gave Grendel a glory or a moment to explain to us that him, being a monster, doesn’t just mean being pure evil, but also being human that has feelings, emotions, and opinion about certain things around him. He wasn’t born as a monster, but he was made by the people as a monster. I like the way the author showed us, how Grendel, as frightening and as scary he was in “Beowulf”, has a human thing in him.
Grendel was made into a monster because that was how readers choose to perceive him. His actions play a part when conclusions are being drawn to the type of person he is. Gardener’s Grendel helps to shed light on him so that readers can see what his true self may be like.
Exactly, a monster is like I said something that causes suffering, grendel is a lesser monster on the grand scale of monstrous things that exist. Grendel was a monster yes because of how you perceive him but he is also a monster reguardless unless you believe murder is ok but then what grendel did wasn’t neccesarily good either.
I think what makes a monster is how it looks like. I think if a monster looks like its scary and has snaggled teeth and has a hairy face, r fangs it is a monster. I think for describing a monster its all about the features on how it look and not how its emotions are or its feeling towards things in life. I think also that the only monster that is really is bad; is mankind. Because you ar the only enemy and the only one who makes your decisions and actions and can take the responsibility for them.
To me, Grendel and his mother are persons. According to Gardner’s novel, Grendel and his mother never meant any harm. In the definition, it said that monsters and creatures are cruel and frightening things, and they never meant to be cruel or frightening but they might have come off that way.
What makes a monster a monster?
I think they way monsters make people feel has a effect on that. If people are frightene or fear by the guy than chances are, hes a monster. Also scary looks helps quite a bit.